


or so the odds ordain

by aceun



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Gen, Haikyuu!! Manga Spoilers, in conclusion i may not show it but i love hinata shouyou more than air
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:28:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26041939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceun/pseuds/aceun
Summary: Climb a mountain only to fall off a mountain.Climb a mountain only to think, ‘I want to stand higher’ and then fall off a mountain, this time with eyes wide open as you step off the ledge, as you buy a ticket to a country on the other side of the world, as you trade hardwood gymnasiums for sand that swallows your ankles. You re-learn how to walk.[An ode to Hinata Shouyou from beginning to end to another beginning, such as it goes.]
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	or so the odds ordain

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by mari and [this comic](https://twitter.com/_geummi/status/1292256698300805121?s=12) that changed my life

Shouyou knows a thing or two about mountains, what with biking up and down one ever since his first day at Karasuno High. Ever since he squealed to a stop in front of an electronics shop, saw a small figure in black jump higher than Shouyou ever dreamed they were allowed, and resolved to wear that uniform to do the same. To fly.

The fact was, there had been no junior high boys volleyball team to start the business of flying, or learning how to fly, which Shouyou piecemealed together by watching the girls team practice and trying to do the drills himself. Which was difficult, to say the least, when most drills required at least another person to pass the ball back, and Shouyou was a one-man army charging into the unknown territory of a sport none of his friends had much interest in. 

But Shouyou took his scraps where he got them and shamelessly, stubbornly, asked for more. 

///

He’s rewarded with a chance to enter a tournament, armed with a team that just barely meets the minimum requirement to participate, and Shouyou feels grateful and giddy and gastrointestinally challenged in equal measures as he prepares to step on court for the first time in his life.

///

Shouyou knows a thing or two about mountains, but he’s never had to play a game against them. And standing at the face of one, two, three Kitagawa Daiichi blockers who really have no business being that tall, he learns that not only does he have to climb a mountain, he has to outmaneuver it. Which goes exactly how the match-up looks on paper. Fight a mountain and you will lose. 

Or so the odds ordain. 

But Shouyou doesn’t care about odds. Shouyou cares about that one centimeter between the ball and the ground, between the ball and his hands, between the ball and the faint possibility of a point that Shouyou pulls into existence with sheer force of will, a miracle tugged from under reality’s heavy boot, as he throws his body against the mountain again and again with gritted teeth and bone-deep belief that this time, it will move for him.

It does not. The tall shadows loom and then disperse, called by the whistle to form a line, to bow, to say _‘Thank you for the game’_ and trot back to their bus waiting outside, but Shouyou isn’t finished. Not yet. 

There, standing on the steps to the gymnasium, his face burns with tears while his chest burns with a conviction that spills out of his mouth into a declaration saying that he, Hinata Shouyou, will stand on the court the longest out of everyone and no mountain, no king will stop him. 

To that, Kageyama Tobio looks him in the eye and tells him to get stronger. 

///

One day he flies, and it’s Kageyama who gives him his wings. 

He says _‘Jump, and I’ll bring the ball to you,’_ so Shouyou jumps, and squeezes his eyes shut, and swings, and feels the weight of the ball delivered to his hand, hears the thud as it slams home on the other side. 

Shouyou knows that he’s inexperienced, and Kageyama will readily add on top of that a number of unflattering synonyms interspersed with choice curses, but for a moment, it’s the furthest thing from what matters. 

His palm stings with proof that he can defy gravity and genetics to grab a point just like any two meter monster. 

Shouyou didn’t have doubts, exactly, or—he wouldn’t call it doubts, per say. He’s confident that he could’ve figured out how to fight in the air even without the twist of destiny that made Kageyama his partner, even if it would’ve taken him just a _little_ bit longer. 

But it’s a relief, still, to know that he doesn’t have to wait. 

Their first quick blows away any traces of fog in his mind to reveal, in all of its intimidating, exhilarating glory, that the mountain is within reach. 

And so he climbs with Karasuno—he flies. 

///

Shouyou flies and he crashes, feels his legs give out from underneath him. Give up. In the middle of a match. When he’s not finished fighting. They say he has a fever. 

They say that this, too, is volleyball. 

There’s a black hole, collapsing in his chest, hollowing him out as he puffs hot air against his mask, breathes in and out as he watches on a tablet screen Kamomendai score that one point that clips Karasuno’s wings in the quarter-finals of Spring Interhigh. 

  
  


_(Climb a mountain only to fall off a mountain.)_

///

There’s Shouyou on a bike. There’s a game on a screen. 

The thing about life, he’s found, is that it walks in circles and has a sick sense of humor. 

Once again, he feels himself stopping, wheels squealing to a stop, as he watches someone soar. The blur of a service ace. The camera zooming. 

Kageyama Tobio, nineteen years old, wearing red and standing on a court on the other side of the city, surrounded by rows and rows of trembling stands filled with people who’ve crossed oceans just to witness this moment, in this stadium, in Rio de Janeiro. 

For now, it is a world both inconceivably far and tantalizingly close, fingertips brushing the bottom of the tallest shelf. Hunger chews on his stomach and Shouyou _craves_. 

He bikes past the TV, delivery bag thumping against his back, as he pedals onwards. Onwards, always, because the alternative has never been an option for someone like him. Someone who carves out opportunities with a spoon, a concrete spoon, who swallows every morsel that presents itself and reaches out for the next bite, knowing that it’s one less than the world would have naturally given.

Shouyou has never hesitated to take. 

It took the force of falling, the shudder of bone, for the other part to hammer home: the importance of conditioning, of proper care, of preparing yourself to be ready to receive. 

  
  


_(Climb a mountain only to think, ‘I want to stand higher’ and then fall off a mountain, this time with eyes wide open as you step off the ledge, as you buy a ticket to a country on the other side of the world, as you trade hardwood gymnasiums for sand that swallows your ankles. You re-learn how to walk.)_

///

The top of the world feels like this: a bus headed to the Olympic stadium bursting with astronomical volume. With people he’s known since high school—fought across the net or side-by-side but orbiting around each other all the same, pulled by the same Molten sun. 

It feels like a reunion. A family gathering and a banquet feast rolled into a single, multi-colored celebration. 

Because that is what this is, volleyball. In the end and in the beginning. Six people standing on court, connecting, keeping a ball in the air, and there is always someone watching. Someone thinking— _this is fun_. 

Because this is volleyball, Shouyou looks up. To the next mountain. And the next. And the next. 

He smiles, and he starts to climb.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter: kitaeun


End file.
